The global emergence of multidrug-resistant bacterial infections has resulted in enormous healthcare costs and has become a major threat to public health. In the U.S. alone, the total cost linked to antibiotic-resistant infections has been estimated at $5 billion annually (Zinner, Expert Rev. Anti. Infect. Ther., 3: 907-913, 2005). About 70 percent of the bacteria that cause infections in hospitals are now resistant to at least one of the drugs most commonly used for treatment. For example, some organisms are resistant to all approved antibiotics and can only be treated with experimental and potentially toxic drugs. Therefore, to stay ahead of the development of antibacterial drug resistance, there is a pressing necessity to identify new antibiotics, especially those with novel mechanisms of action, and methods for producing such antibiotics.